Popular online video web site Hulu has gained major traction in the past year, thanks in part to…
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That's right, there's BitTorrent—the file sharing protocol that so many people were using before they were finally offered a content provider-approved method of watching the shows they love. In the end, it wasn't about the commercials—it was about the convenience. People were happy to watch Hulu on their TVs via Boxee, and yeah, sit through the Hulu commercials, because it was more convenient than hassling with BitTorrent downloads. It's not about piracy or "stealing" from content providers because people are malicious like that; it's about convenience.

Mac OS X/Linux: Open-source media center application Boxee has updated with a new interface…
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Let's say that I'm already paying for cable, but I didn't watch the show when it aired. Sure, I could watch it on Hulu on my laptop, but I want to watch it on my TV. And why shouldn't I be able to? What's the difference between serving ads through my monitor and my HDTV? I'll still sit through them, because they're more convenient than the alternative. Yeah, more convenient than BitTorrent. Or at least it was.

But BitTorrent's not that inconvenient, especially after Hulu's content providers reject progress in favor of their tried and true one-step-forward, two-steps-back philosophy of progress. BitTorrent is easy to get the hang of, people.

Web site FeedMyTorrents publishes RSS feeds of torrents for popular TV shows. Just subscribe to…
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Keep in mind, we're not saying "Go pirate every Hulu show now that Hulu won't let you watch it the way you want to." But that is what people will do. Everyone watching Hulu through Boxee is an early adopter—they know how to make things work. The point is—as O'Reilly's Mark Hedlund articulated better than we could:

I'm sure Hulu is totally pissed. They pretty much said just that in a somewhat more stilted way. The real insult, though, is calling the people who made them cut Boxee off "content providers." They might as well have told the studios they are the moral equivalent of the guy schlepping reels around the projector booth. Someone will win this war eventually, they seem to be saying, and you could have helped make it us. Now you have a choice: someone else — not you, someone smart — will win instead, or you can change your mind.

That's pretty much my view, too. DVDs (mentioned in the note at the start) became a big boon for the studios, once their crazy ideas about self-destructing Divx discs went the way of the Dodo. The studios have a very long history of betting against technology people want, and on technology people don't want. This is just another such case. The technology people want always wins in the end — no duh — and usually benefits the businesses who fought that technology to the death. Here's hoping the technology people want — Boxee — doesn't wind up benefiting the studios fighting it now.

Did you feel the sting from the Hulu block—whether it was the Boxee or TV.com block? Let's hear your reaction in the comments.